Mark states that 91% of forest is excluded from logging. These are the actual numbers:

Total forest Victoria = 7.9 million Ha, conservation reserves 3,050,000 (38%) (not sure if the reserves figure includes the "Clayton's reserves"), area available for logging 2,494,000 (31.5%)

Multiple-use state forests = area 3,312,000, available for logging 2,053,000 (62%) All DSE figures

It's worth remembering that some reserves have extensive logging histories e.g. Croajingolong NP.

Cinders (of mental faculties?)-

The Expert Independent Advisory Panel (EIAP) found that “...a large number of coupes which require further remedial treatment to achieve adequate regeneration. ...significant areas that have no stocking records or are overdue for surveys... Backlog regeneration has existed for a number of years, and the issue will continue to remain until funding and resources are made available. (EIAP, p.9 MAHP Review June 2008).

Where did I say that all regeneration efforts failed?

"... harvesting does not destroy their environmental values,"

How long does it take for hollows to occur in trees? What is the period between logging rotations? How can you say there is no impact on environmental values if the original complement of species cannot occupy the site?

This is a regrowth forest...

http://melbournecatchments.org/wp-content/uploads/regrowth_thomson3_800px.jpg

and this is a old growth forest...

http://melbournecatchments.org/wp-content/uploads/oldgrowth_small1.jpg

Spot any differences? Apparently, some can't.

Oh, and for the record, this is a clearfell...

http://www.forestnetwork.net/CH11-02/Mount%20Vinegar%20Coupe1.jpg

and this is a burnt forest...

http://glenburn.vic.au/assets/image/1259640480-dscn2539.jpg

Spot any differences? Apparently, some can't.

Tragic (apt nick) :

“Ecological information is comprehensive for at least 10% of mammal, bird and amphibian species, while partial ecological information is available for about 60% of known forest dwelling vertebrate and vascular plant species. Ecological information is very limited for most forest dwelling invertebrates, fungi, algae and lichens.

1,287 forest dwelling species are listed as vulnerable, endangered or threatened under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999. “ DAFF

No extinctions yet as far as we know but you reckon it's all hunky dory?

Maate & others

We haven't even mentioned the result of erosion caused by clear-felling.

The loss of top-soil, minerals, habitat altered irrevocably, permanent alteration of landscape. The list goes on.

On a global basis:

"The forests have global implications not just on life but on the quality of it. Trees improve the quality of the air that species breath by trapping carbon and other particles produced by pollution. Trees determine rainfall and replenish the atmosphere. As more water gets put back in the atmosphere, clouds form and provide another way to block out the sun�s heat. Trees are what cool and regulates the earth�s climate in conjunction with other such valuable services as preventing erosion, landslides, and making the most infertile soil rich with life. Mother earth has given much responsibility to trees."

http://www.umich.edu/~gs265/society/deforestation.htm

To the very local:

"Erosion is happening at 10-20 times faster than the rate topsoil can be formed by natural processes. [Pimentel 2006] Plantations and mono-culture re-growth on short term rotations (10 to 30 years) will result in continuous soil disturbance and nutrient loss, pauperising the soil and landscapes and destroying water catchments. This erosion together with the loss of organic matter which typically contains 3-4 times as much carbon as the vegetation above the ground together with continual burning of short term rotations will result in the pauperisation of the land and loss of productivity. "

http://www.water-sos.org/sediment-nutrient-loss.html

As I stated in my first post to this thread claiming clear-felling environmentally is a nonsense. No amount of proselytising will change what is fact.

You're correct to highlight impacts on soils Severin.

I mentioned the possible adverse chemical reactions when subsoil is exposed. Mark tried to play down this aspect but anyone who has spent any time in logging coupes will have seen that such impacts are common and widewspread.

Additional to erosion is the distubance to soil profiles and micro flora and fauna populations. Anyone with a slight knowledge about forest ecology will be aware of the importance of myccorhizal associations in overall forest health. I remember hearing about some research that found a large proportion of carbon in a forest is in the soil and that fungi makes up a significant part of that component.

We can only wonder about the ecological effects of periodic radical soil disturbance and the removal of large amounts of carbon (mainly for woodchip production). It's a massive gamble on landscape scale. Research is often decades behind practice. As the "Anthropocene" epoch establishes itself, it is imperative we move to a precautionary approach in managing and exploiting natural systems.

When Melbourne was founded explorers and pioneers of the local region gave accounts of massive old growth Ash forests in the Central Highlands. The fire intervals at higher elevations must have stretched beyond 500 years. The physical structure, rainforest understory and hydrological cycle must have made these forests fire resistant so they would have acted as natural barriers to widespread conflagration.

Now "expert" foresters like Mark tell us they are "mimicking" nature with their broadacre industrial forestry regimes. Looking at their pissy regrowth "mosaic of forests of different ages" I don't know whether to laugh or cry.

Having wrought unmitigated havoc on these natural systems they now find ever more 'creative' ways to disrupt natural processes.

Because managed forests are a valuable asset, non-productive forests (those that provide only ecological services) must be constantly fuel reduced so they don't threaten the addicts' cash crop. How does this affect those forests? What changes occur? Who cares! Forestry is a
science don't you know!

Cont...

Thinning - not satisfied with 80 year rotations that cut natural cycles off at the knees, they now have thinning operations. After 45 years the regrowth Ash forests can be lovingly tended by reducing the number of stems per hectare. We all know know about the dangers of fuel build up in forests so what do they do about the slash (the crowns, bark and foliage of thinned trees)? Well because the forest is a valuable cash crop that would be damaged by a fuel reduction burn they leave it sitting in forest waiting for...

Since colonisation Victoria has lost over half its forest cover and much of the remaining forest has been extensively modified. You'd think the timber industry would know when enough is enough but they are still predominately focused on forests that have not been logged before. Woodchipping it for export with the odd sawlog figleaf to justify the charade.

The industry tell us they are good citizens and how important they are but millions of tons of timber is being exported raw while related jobs continue to dwindle. There they are again, crying poor and dabbing their moistened eyes while holding out their cap for more taxpayer subsidies. Such honest and hard working people...who aren't averse to bashing and terrorising young Australians who make a stand on conviction.

Any forest that has not been modified since colonisation should be left for posterity. That means everything from natural regrowth to senescent trees that predate Cook by centuries.

In the modified forests, management and productions systems must restore ecological processes. That starts with dumping the archaic practice of clearfelling.

We should go further and extend those principles to agricultural forestry on private land. Those systems should also complement nature. Broadacre industrial monocultures do not. Plantations are not only environmentally unsustainable they are socially and economically unsustainable as we have seen with the MIS debacle. I can understand why a forester would like to see hundreds and thousands of individual land titles aggregated into corporate ownership but what about the communities who have these corporations for neighbours?

"A bit of logging stimulates all sorts of grandiose misconceptions and conspiracy theories that all the forests are going to disappear."

I note the use of 'grandiose misconceptions' and 'conspiracy theories' rather than valid concerns. All depends what end of the argument one comes from which will determine the phraseology used on both sides of the forestry debate.

Do you believe that if there were never any concerns, protests or lobbying from environmental groups that the old growth forests saved from logging would have naturally occured?

I suspect not, but I am a cynic when it comes to environmental protection vs business interests and the way governments might handle those two opposing needs, without the noise from the environmentalists.

Maate

Really appreciate your acknowledgement of damage at the micro level. Fungi and bacterial disturbance is not easily observable by a cursory glance at an area of bushland. One cannot evaluate a soil profile by just looking. It requires study over periods of time that are not compatible with logging interests. I have tried to emphasise that the time-lines the logging industry is applying to its pseudo-regeneration is as lacking in working knowledge as it is premature in its claims. Have not had any response regarding this point. All we hear is a variety of disproved claims that stripping a landscape of its vegetation is all good. It is only good for the likes of Gunns et al. The economic value of undisturbed eco-systems continues to be ignored for the benefit of short term interests.

Pelican

The argument put forward by the pro-logging contingent on this thread emphasises the truth of your post, if there was no problem with clear felling - there would not be the protest, arguments and research into clear-felling.